Yes. This is happening. As of this morning, Odonata Beer Company’s highly coveted Saison, its very first bottle release since the company was founded in 2009, has been loaded onto trucks headed to various specialty beer retailers throughout Northern California. The beer was originally released in May and, until now, it was only available on draught in Sacramento and some VERY select accounts in the Bay Area.

Odonata Brewmaster, Peter Hoey, designed the recipe for his flagship beer based on a previous Saison recipe that earned him a prestigious gold medal at the Great American Beer Festival in 2006. Odonata Saison is unfiltered, bottle-conditioned, and boasts a full, rich body with hints of spice and a super dry finish.

“Our Saison is intended to be two things: complex and dry-finishing. We built a foundation with our grain bill & hop additions that are intended to let the yeast take center stage – it’s an absolutely beautiful yeast with a lot of character. We love Saison and are happy to see it’s rise in popularity. We’re not trying to redefine the style, in fact we’ve consulted the books to see how it’s been made historically and have done our best to be true to the Belgian tradition. Our ingredients are simple: barley, wheat, oats, hops, water & yeast. However, by giving the yeast a comfortable place to play and grow our Saison is everything we hoped it would be: complex, dry, full of flavor and character – an absolute pleasure to quaff.” – Rick Sellers, co-founder Odonata Beer Company

Initially, the Saison bottle shipments will reach as far north as Arcata, as far south as Livermore, east to Auburn and west to San Francisco. Seeing how just about every released keg of the Odonata Saison has been emptied within 2-3 hours of tapping, I doubt that these bottles will last long on the shelves at all.

“We also had the goal of putting an affordable Saison on the market, something people won’t shy away from. Our goal is to sell at stores for $5.99 a 22-ounce bottle, which seems to be about $1.50 less than the next Saison in the California market.” – Rick Sellers, co-founder Odonata Beer Company

Odonata Beer Company is based in Sacramento, California. Brewmaster Peter Hoey is an experienced, award-winning brewer as well as an instructor at UC Davis’ brewing school and The American Brewers Guild. Sales Director Rick Sellers is an experienced beer journalist and the former Beer Director for DRAFT Magazine, the world’s largest beer publication. Together Peter & Rick started Odonata Beer Co. in 2009, with their first beer release scoring a perfect 100 on RateBeer, ranking in the top-ten in the world for its style.